Posted by Rizwan on 22/9/2009, 16:59:24, in reply to "Re: The Vicar and the backs of books"
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I'm more inclined to believe the blurbs with regard to classic books. The blurbs generally weren't written for the purpose of putting them on the back of books, but often were taken instead from journals, essays, letters, etc.
With contemporary books, however, I take the blurbs with a grain of salt. I suspect the blurbs often are written by friends of the author, or they were written for a price. A former work colleague of mine, for example, once studied with the writer Mary Gordon at Columbia and became good friends with her. This person's glowing blurb appears on the back of one of Gordon's books.
Then there is the case of Jacques Pepin regarding cookbooks, supporting what Steven suggested. I can't remember the details exactly, but apparently he gave a fantastic blurb for a book whose author later was charged with plagiarism. Perhaps to save face and his reputation, Pepin admitted that he never actually read the book or tested the recipes, but simply was paid for providing the blurb.
